NICKY M’S KITCHEN – CALANGUTE’S NEWEST BURGER CAFE

Edit: Nicky M’s Kitchen has shut down.

I never thought I’d miss writing about restaurants and food as much as I did over the last 4 months. While restaurants had begun opening up for home deliveries and takeaways for over a month now, the family and I stuck to our guns and fought every urge to relish something delicious from the outside world. But when burgers are involved, my resolve is weak, hahaha!

Nicky M’s Kitchen

One of the first places I visited was Nicky M’s Kitchen – a small restaurant in Calangute serving a selection of burgers and double-decker sandwiches. At just 5 weeks old, the restaurant opened right after the lockdown was partially lifted – a trying time for businesses, especially those in the F&B space. Nevertheless, Nicky M’s Kitchen has been doing quite well for itself, despite it’s infancy, and has been getting orders from as far as Caranzalem, without even being on Swiggy and Zomato!

What lends an advantage to Nicky M’s Kitchen is the fact that the Chef, Nikhil Mirkar, once had a popular restaurant in Porvorim, with a loyal client base. Secondly, most of the burger places in Goa are still shut, and Goans have gone without the occasional burger for way too long. And third, the restaurant amps up its levels of deliciousness with Thursday Specials – offering one dish that’s not on the menu but sounds too yummy to resist – I’m taking about Boozy Pork Ribs and Mexican Chilli Corn Carne with Goan Sausages *drool*…

GETTING THERE:

Nicky M’s Kitchen isn’t located right in the middle of the action, like Artisan Backerei, Amavi and Tio Tillys are. To find this burger joint easily, look for Mr. Toff Toff’s Pub on Google Maps, which is the space that this new restaurant has taken over and is operating out of.

WHAT TO TRY:

You’ll find the usual suspects like a Chicken/Pork/Beef Whopper, the classic BLT burger, the house special (Nicky M’s Special Pork/Beef/Chicken Burger), the Pork and Fried Egg Burger and a few veg options on the menu. Out of the burgers, I’d definitely recommend the Nicky M’s Special Pork Burger for its succulent patty and delicious homemade sauce, which was slightly on the sweeter side. I also tried the Chicken BLT which was nothing to write home about – but the familiarity of the taste of a BLT burger brought a smile to my face!

We also tried the BBQ Chicken double-decker sandwich and that was spot-on perfect! Crispy, buttered bread, with a generous amount of filling that had a harmonious mix of savory and sweet – it would make for a fantastic breakfast, snack, or even lunch. Would highly recommend this one! What would have made the dining experience at Nicky M’s Kitchen better was some more burger-joint friendly options on the menu as add-ons to the burger as well as to be served as separate items – chicken wings, French fries or potato wedges, onion rings, pickles… the kind of thing that makes a burger-eating experience complete. Since we’re still in the midst of COVID-19, all restaurants are prohibited from serving alcohol at this time.

What’s noteworthy is that Chef Nikhil and his wife, Jui, keep experimenting and innovating with his recipes, dishes, sauces, and more – until they get them just right. Their menu, they say, is a work in progress and they intend to keep evolving, not just in the long run, but even week-on-week.

COVID-PRECAUTIONS:

Hello, new addition to my restaurant reviews! It is imperative that we know and trust the places we visit during these whacky COVID-19 times, so I have to mention the precautions the restaurant takes (as well as the ones they should take) until it’s safe to return to normalcy.

NickyM’s Kitchen places hand sanitizer at the entrance of the restaurant and guests’ temperatures are checked before being allowed entry. The staff wear masks and gloves and the tables are sanitized as soon as the guest walks out – literally, I had barely made it to the car when they began wiping down the table I was seated at.  The tables are well spaced out with more than 6 feet of space between each, plus, since the risk of contracting the virus is less outdoors than in confined spaces, you can choose to sit at the picnic tables placed outside.

I do hope you’ll try this place out and support local restaurants around you when you can! I’ll be sharing about another cute, new cafe that just opened up, in my next post. Stay tuned for that, and follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram until then!